Lazar Berman is The Times of Israel s diplomatic reporter
Signs shows the distances of Beirut and Jerusalem, that set at a road that links to a UNIFIL base where the Lebanese and Israeli delegations meet, in Naqoura, Lebanon, Tuesday, May 4, 2021. (AP/Hussein Malla)
Looking out from the limestone cliffs of Rosh Hanikra, the tiny “island” of Tekheilet is barely visible, a rocky outcropping just barely kissing the waveline a kilometer from Israel’s shoreline at the country’s northern frontier.
In November 2020, Energy Minister Yuval Steinitz, his chief of staff Mor Halutz and ministry director-general Udi Adiri donned bright orange lifejackets and clambered onto the islet for a spot of tea and a show of Israel’s claim not only to the island but to the expanse of sea stretching far beyond.